Clarissa West
Personality Clarissa is an emotionally damaged girl. She has flashbacks from her past which cause her to lose focus on the things around her in the present. She’s never felt love in any form except from an old friend of hers. The bounty hunters left a deep scar on her emotionally, to the point where most people think she’s crazy or insane unless they have heard about her past. She hates her father for never helping her, never caring for her in any form or way, letting her get stuffed into an orphanage a few days after she was born. She has problems trusting people causing her to be in fear almost every waking second. Because of the bounty hunters, she became an insomniac and she rarely ever sleeps. Sometimes she’ll even see things that aren’t really there, that are triggered by familiar things and objects causing her to go into a state of extreme fear. Before the bounty hunters, she was a quiet, kind girl but, the hunt changed her forever. History Victoria West, a prostitute trying to scrape by, was trying to earn some money at a strip club one night when she ran into a young man. Victoria quickly decided to get him drunk and try to make some money off of him. They both quickly got drunk after a few short hours and Victoria led him to one of the backrooms and they made love then soon after Apollo passed out. Victoria quickly took any money he had on him and left, going back to her small crappy home on the outskirts of New Orleans, Louisiana. After a month or so, Victoria learned she was pregnant. She thought about abortion but, decided quickly that it wasn’t an option and instead decided to give the baby away after it was born. Around eight months later, Clarissa was born and a few days later, Victoria drove to Monroe, Louisiana and abandoned the baby on the doorstep of an orphanage but, not before knocking on the door. Then Victoria left quickly. Within minutes, a nun who helped run the orphanage opened the door to find the baby. She looks around but, didn’t seem surprised, like this happened a lot. She scooped the baby into her arms and took her in. Clarissa grew up in the orphanage with thirteen other kids, ages ranging from five to fourteen, with her being the youngest. When she was around five, she wandered away from the orphanage grounds and into the swamp behind the house and within minutes, she found herself lost. She felt alone and scared and hid inside a hollow tree. She stayed there hoping that someone from the orphanage would find her but, instead a young boy around the age of eight found her. He was dressed in tattered old clothes and was shocked to find the little five year-old alone in the swamp. The boy’s name was Rye West and he told her that his parents abandoned him a few days back and he knew this swamp by heart as his father would bring him here to hunt. Since it was getting dark, Rye didn’t want to risk getting Clarissa hurt or lost so he stayed in the tree with her until daylight. The next morning, Rye took her back to the orphanage to find everyone going out of their minds with worry. The nuns were so happy that Rye had found and brought Clarissa back and as soon as they learned his story, they offered to let him live here. Clarissa was over joyed at the thought but, Rye didn’t seem at eager as she was. It took Clarissa almost a week to convinced Rye to stay but, in the end she was pleased with her little five year-old self. By the time Clarissa was seven, she and Rye were very close. One weekend, Rye took her through the swamp to his old home. The house was almost in ruinins if it wasn’t for the fact that Rye came back and fixed it up as often as he could. He also decided to teach her how to hunt the swamp animals. Clarissa wasn’t too sure at first but, Rye convinced her that it might help her in a life-or-death problem in the future. Rye taught her archery, which she seemed to have a talent for, and throwing daggers and tomahawks. Clarissa didn’t know how this would help her much in the future but, it helped her release her anger and it passed time quicker. During this time, Clarissa was also trying to get adopted by the few couples who came to the orphanage looking to add a new member to their families. At first, the families enjoyed little Clarissa but, when they went into the head nun’s office for the adoption meeting and returned, they had changed their minds, picking a different little boy or girl. By the age of twelve, Clarissa was in a slight state of depression and rarely talked to anyone except for Rye and the nuns. Rye quickly started worrying about Clarissa and finally decided to try and get the both of them out of the orphanage. When Rye explained that he wanted her to run away with him, Clarissa eagerly agreed since she believed she had no chance of having any other family but, Rye. So one fall night, Clarissa and Rye packed up their very few belongings and snuck out of the orphanage, they agreed that they would stay the night at Rye’s old home until dawn then head out, as it was too dangerous to travel through the swamp at night. The next morning, they gathered their stuff including the weapons they had stored in the old house and set out through the swamp. They didn’t even make it five miles without one of them getting hurt, which gave the search party time to find them and take them back to Monroe, where they spent the night in a hospital getting treated for hypothermia. Once they were back to health, they were returned to orphanage, where the head nun was very disappointed in them and decided it wasn’t safe for them to be together anymore. While she was making arrangements for Rye to be put in a foster home, Clarissa was devastated and would barely ever let Rye out of her sight which it didn’t bother him since he was doing the same. The night before Rye would be taken to his new foster home, Clarissa and Rye went into the woods to be alone for a little while. They spent an hour or two talking, trying to figure out how they could try and convince the head nun to let Rye stay but, they couldn’t come up with any ideas at the moment. Right before they went inside, Rye stopped Clarissa and she was confused until he kissed her. She was surprised at first before she returned the kiss. It was short but, sweet. The next morning, Rye was gone before Clarissa even woke up. The other kids told her that he wanted to say good-bye but, the head nun wouldn’t allow it, saying it would just make it harder to say good-bye. This pissed Clarissa off and she went into a deeper state of depression then went mute. She wouldn’t talk to anyone or anything because she felt betrayed by the only home she had ever had. By the time Clarissa was sixteen, everyone thought she would never talk again. She did the same thing every day. She woke up, ate, went to the small school inside the orphanage, ate again, went into the swamp for a few hours then returned and went to bed. When she went into the swamp, she would practice her archery skills, keeping a promise to Rye to never get rusty. She hid her bow and quiver of arrows in a hollow tree about two hundred feet into the forest. WIP Gallery m_1798101_iIlsZxm3LasY.jpg Golden-Eagle-in-pine-HRM.jpg|Clarissa in Bird Form Category:Characters Category:ShadowGoddess Category:Female Category:Bird Shape-Shifters